New president Jaya hopes to raise MGF profile
(For 2017-2021) President: Datuk Jaya Al Bakri
Deputy president: Kau Git Kaur
Vice-presidents: Francis Loh Soong Park, Mike Ng Sik Hoi, Petrina Low
Treasurer: Yang Fairuz Abdul Aziz
Secretary: Jimmy Tan Chi Min
Assistant secretary: Lee Wan Nin
KUA LA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Gymnastics Federation (MGF) have a new man in charge. And, with that, a fresh perspective.
Datuk Jaya Al Bakri was elected president at the association’s annual general meeting ( AGM) yesterday. He takes over from A. Razak Mat Amin.
The 51-year-old businessman, who runs an oil and gas company, hopes to raise the profile of MGF.
“I’m happy to join the gymnastics family. I have mixed feelings. I’m excited to lead the association but I’m also anxious as I’m coming in from the corporate field,” said Jaya.
“Hopefully I can bring fresh perspective to the sport from my experience in the corporate world.
“One of the plans is to bring in sponsors to enhance our development programmes to unearth talents. The sponsors will come in if there’s a good working relationship between the states and the national body.
“There are successful models out there like FAM (Football Association of Malaysia) and BAM (Badminton Association of Malaysia). They have tied up with many sponsors. I’d like MGF to be a successful association too.”
Jaya was delighted with the 13 gold medals gymnastics contributed at the Kuala Lumpur SEA Games last month.
“We are outstanding in this region. We must now raise our level. Our gymnasts must be able to win medals at higher level tournaments like the Commonwealth Games and Asian Games,” said Jaya, who promised to take MGF to a higher level.